London Art News previews art exhibitions in London and reports on anything of special interest in the visual arts worldwide, from ice sculpture to body painting.

Friday, 22 May 2015

Shakespeare's Face

Country Life isn't the sort of magazine in which one expects to find scoops. let alone the scoop of the century; but here is its cover for 20 May showing the only portrait of William Shakespeare made during his lifetime. Botanist and historian Mark Griffiths found the engraving on the title page of a 400-year-old book The Herball by pioneering botanist John Gerard, published in 1598. He identifies Shakespeare by various means, including the laurel wreath of a poet and by the snake's head fritillary, which Shakespeare knew about and mentions in a poem and in his play Titus Andronicus. Of course other academics have given Mark's claim the raspberry (CLICK).